Note: This email was sent to everyone that registered to attend the OpenVA conference, if you believe you are registered but did not receive this email let us know by emailing jimgroom@gmail.com ASAP.

Hello all,

I want to start this email by thanking you all for your patience it was has been a fairly drawn out planning process given we were forced to reschedule last March due to an anomalous snow storm. That said, it is time to get excited again because the schedule for OpenVA is nothing short of amazing. Over 230 people from just about every college and university around the state of Virginia will be on hand to share the work they’re doing. And that is what this conference is all about!

What’s more, if you are coming into town the day before, October 14th, we recommend you registering for the “Minding the Future” event (it’s totally free and dinner will be served) to listen to a number of nationally recognized technologists and educators discuss the broader national landscape when it comes to the convergence of education and technology. If you are interested, go here to register. Think of this as setting the conceptual table for the following day’s event at OpenVA that will demonstrate the innovative thinking and practices happening around the state.

Some important details!

Directions to OpenVA (Oct 15)
OpenVA will be taking place at UMW’s Stafford Campus, here is a link to it on Google Maps. Keep in mind it’s about 15 minutes northwest of the Fredericksburg Campus (exit 133 West on the 95).

Directions to “Minding the Future” (Oct 14)
The “Minding the Future” event happening on October 14th from 2:30-7:30 will be held at the Jepson Alumni Executive Center on the Fredericksburg Campus, here is a map for that.

Carnival Presenters
If you are presenting in the morning at the carnival and have not been contacted about any technical requirements you might have, please contact us immediately at jimgroom@gmail.com

All Other Presenters
If you have technical requirements beyond a provided computer (or a computer hookup) and internet, please let us know ASAP.

Finally, if there are any emergency issues related to weather or otherwise leading up to the conference please check the OpenVA website for announcements and information: http://openva.org.

And that’s that, barring another act of God this conference is on like Donkey Kong!

I learned this past week that Sarah McConnell of NPR’s With Good Reason radio show will be coming to OpenVA on October 15th. The With Good Reason crew will be interviewing various people throughout the day from around the state as well as taking in the tech carnival, Fred Talks, afternoon presentations, and featured panels. It’s exciting to learn that a public radio show focused on education is coming to OpenVA. That said, it’s also entirely appropriate given the conference is focused on findings ways to promote the amazing work happening around Virginia’s public institutions of higher education, as well as fostering more robust and lasting statewide collaborations. Bring your radio voices, people!

OpenVA just got that much more awesome with this conference before the conference. On Monday, October 14th we will be bringing in five world-reknowned thinkers to discuss the disrutpive nature of technology and its impact on higher education. This event will be held at UMW’s Jepson Executive Alumni Center and is free and open to the public as long as seats are available (register here). This event was made possible by an auspicious alignment of resources, and it might be thought of as both a primer for and prelude to OpenVA.

What might Virginia’s higher ed institutions do in terms of experimenting with distributed, virtual learning? How can the Commonwealth encourage technology-mediated exploration, collaboration, and implementation amongst a wide range of faculty, technologists, and students from its 39 public institutions of higher ed? These are two of the questions I’ve been thinking a lot about recently. In fact, I talk about them to just about anyone who’ll listen. A couple of months ago I asked Joe DeFillipo and Beverly Covington of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV), whom I’ve been working closely with on OpenVa for the last 18 months, what Virginia is doing at the statewide level in terms of fostering collaboration amongst its public universities and colleges. The question seemed worth pursuing, so we organized a discussion about that very idea a few weeks later.

The conference committee has decided to reschedule the first annual Digital learning Resources conference for October 15th at UMW’s Stafford Campus. We understand that rescheduling may present certain scheduling challenges and conflicts for some, but given the restraint on facilities and open dates on UMW’s campus this is the date the worked best.

If you were scheduled to present, and this causes any issues please contact us directly here. If you were registered to attend, but can’t attend given the the new dates, let us know using

Due to the threat of severe winter weather throughout the state the OpenVA steering committee has decided to postpone the conference until Fall 2013. We will be contacting all registrants with the new date as soon as it is decided.

We’ll be updating this post regularly with information regarding the weather and the possibility of cancellation due to inclement weather. As of now, the conference will only be cancelled if the University of Mary Washington is closed this Thursday—let’s hope for the best!